Abstract

Diet analysis revealed that Apocryptes bato is a carnivorous fish. It depends on shrimps and non-shrimp crustaceans mainly. Shrimps include Acetes, penaeid and metapenaeid juveniles, whereas non-shrimp crustaceans include copepods, crab larvae, mysids and amphipods predominantly. The total body lengths (TL) varied between 11.20 and 22.20 cm and weight 16.70 to 43.50 g in male fish. The form of the equation for TL and weight relationship was W = 0.44TL2.57 and for standard length (SL) it was W = 1.009SL2.66. Condition factor (K) ranged from 0.87 to 1.23. The TL was 15.00 to 26.00 cm and weight as 25.1 to 38.50 g in female. The equation was W = 1.001TL2.52 for TL and W = 1.003SL2.63 for SL and K value ranged from 0.95 to 1.106. The coefficient of correlation was tested with t test and found highly significant at the 5% level of significance for TL and SL both in the case of male and female.